Modern communication and data networks are comprised of nodes that transport data through the network. The nodes may include routers, switches, and/or bridges that transport the individual data frames or packets through the network. A hybrid switching network is one in which the network can transport connection-oriented traffic (e.g. traffic associated with Provider Backbone Bridging-Traffic Engineering (PBB-TE)) or connectionless traffic (e.g. traffic associated with Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs)). Specifically, the network may contain a plurality of VLAN identifiers (VIDs), and each VID may be associated with either connection-oriented or connectionless routing. For example, connectionless routing, such as hop-by-hop forwarding, can be associated with some VIDs, while connection-oriented routing, such pre-determined path forwarding, can be associated with other VIDs.
One of the problems that occur in hybrid switching networks is the misprovisioning of a node, i.e. failing to configure the node with the correct forwarding type associated with at least one VID. A node can be misprovisioned, for example, when a provider changes a VID from bridged forwarding to switched forwarding in the network without appropriately configuring the node. Consequently, the misprovisioned node continues to implement bridged forwarding instead of switched forwarding for packets associated with the VID. In some instances, transport leaks can occur where the misprovisioned nodes may flood a frame or forward multiple frame copies over more than one connection to a single destination. This results in increased bandwidth consumption and failure to meet service guarantees on some connections.